Another Point of View
by treehugger00
Summary: Suffering a lack of enthusiasm as of late, I decided to try dashing off (invested a week on research) this one shot based on the opening scenes of the two thousand five movie in hopes of priming the pump of creativity. Warning, contains some profanity and gore. Wishing you all peace and joy over the coming holiday season and the year ahead.


(As always, I draw inspiration for my stories from the Chronicles of Narnia in all it's manifestations, both canon and non-canon).

Disclaimer: The Chronicles of Narnia are the intellectual property of Clive Staples Lewis and his legally recognized representatives. We come here just to play in his garden.

Warning: This narrative contains some profanity and depictions of gore. If your easily offended please be tolerant an try and remember the times and places this story is set in, thank you.

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**Another point of view**

Propped up on the pad provided for him in the cramped nose of the heinkel one eleven, bomb aimer Ernst - Erny Gunter, looked through the eye piece of the unfamiliar contraption. The Hauptmann leading the staffel had been tasked with field testing the new lotfe seven-B bomb sight for final avaluation before they were put into general service.

Tucked in among the other schwarm of the gruppen, it felt to Erny like a giant game of follow the leader as they were funneled into hell's gaping maw. Hanging up here in the dark afforded him little chance of glorious victory over his enemy in personal combat unless one wished to count trying to shoot down barrage balloons.

Reichsmarschall Goring's plan to sweep away all resistance in the skies above Britain in preparation for the up coming invasion hadn't gone quite as expected. Those decadent aristocrats, spineless politicians and lazy shiftless store keepers herr Goring was always deriding had proven to be as tuff and tenacious as the bulldogs they seem so fond of. This left the vaunted Luftwaffe in the unenviable roll of playing rogues and hooligans skulking about in the darkness assaulting defenseless women and little children. Not quite the vision he held of himself as a knight in shining armor, aryan blood coursing through his veins as he charged out to do battle with the infidels who threatened the new order.

The unceasing roar of the engines penetrating both his flight helmet and ear phones for most of the trip sounded to him now like they were murmuring the promise of home. The rhythmic thrum of the motors would occasionally be punctuated by the thud of an antiaircraft shell exploding some distance away. Everyone on board knew this was a prelude to the storm they were fast approaching.

A nearby airburst causing the plane to shudder around him, Ernst raised his head looking through the glass bullet shaped nose of the machine searching the night for the rest of their companions. 'Poor Bastards' he thought, one of those ships would not make it back tonight, at least that's what the know-it-alls had told them. He, like everyone else was sure he would be one of the lucky ones. If he allowed himself to believe otherwise they'd have needed a gun to get him to climb into the belly of this beast.

Bowing his head once again to look through the optics of the bomb sight, anyone seeing him now would be reminded of a supplicant prostrate before this alter of his new lord and savior Herr Hitler. Lately though, he was having second thoughts about where his beliefs truly lay. Back when they were still flying daytime sorties, the sight of their already dead radio operator Karl, his body still twitching on the floor of the plane had a profound effect on him. Watching the last beats of karl's heart pumping out the fellow's lifeblood from the stump where most of his head use to be had driven home the truth to the young man. Death could come at any moment, was he ready for it. The faith of his fathers he in his youth had casually cast aside now held greater significance for him.

Below, the fire ravaged banks of the river Thames behind them they set their sights on their main target, the rail junction just to the north of Finchley. In order of importance the small depot and insignificant trackage would have been deemed of little strategic value. The Reich Ministry of War, however, had decided the site would make the ideal candidate on which to test the accuracy of the new bomb sight. The sprinkling of nearby storehouses was considered a bonus, any loss of life among the civilian population was deemed acceptable. Killing unarmed civilians had never set well with him but he took solace in the fact this target was at least a legitimate line of communication and this was not going to be just another terror raid.

The clusters of small fires stretching away to the north, fires spawn by incendiary devices drop by pathfinders pointed the way to their target. The little fires reminded Ernst of sparks escaping from a freshly stirred up campfire. Taking a stab at trying to estimate their number he was surprised to see one of them separate itself from the rest and begin following a parallel course to them.

Reaching up to switch on his microphone to report to Pilot what he had seen, his hand froze in place. Through the sight, Ernst saw what look like a long silvery needle just up ahead, then another appeared and another and another until the sky was full of them. These, he knew what these were, he had seen them often enough. They were the light reflecting off bombs, german bombs - their bombs.

"Fools, the god damned fools. The god damned goat kissing fools," he swore under his breath.

Somewhere up ahead, by accident or perhaps design, the lead ship had prematurely discharged it's ordnance and the two other schwarm had followed suit. The bile churning in his stomach he realized that blanket of death was going to land on women and children huddled together in cellars down there.

The splinters of light along with the bombs that reflected them disappeared into the night leaving the forgotten little spark in the lower corner of the view finder seemingly trying to command his attention.

Ernst watched the small amber flame pulse twice from golden yellow to a dazzling white color then reach up for him so quickly he didn't even have time to tense up. In that fraction of a second just before it hit, Ernst imagined the spark to be the exhaust of some hitherto unknown enemy self guided missile.

'The hit', when it did come was nothing like what Ernst had expected. The brilliant light filling the eye piece reminded him of a golden sunset at the end of a perfect day. Two eyes appeared inside the sunburst. Two sorrow filled eyes that seem to look accusingly into the depths of the soul of the bombardier. A face, not of a man but of a lion, materialized around those eyes leaving Ernst dumbfounded. The moment seemingly frozen in time the logical, practical mind of the man cast about for a reasonable explanation for what he had seen.

'A product of psychological warfare? Yes, that must be the answer' he thought. 'A tightly focused beam from some new kind of searchlight, projecting a picture upwards into the bombsight to blind and confuse the flight crew.' That made the most sense but something deep inside him rejected the idea. A sharp pain to the left side of his lower back filled him with dread. Had he in fact suffered a physical injury making this all just a shock induced delusion.

He was struck again and this time it was followed by the captain's shrill voice as the man planted the heel of his right boot into the small of Ernst back. "Ernst... Erny you dumb head, what are you doing. Wake up and get rid of those bombs, the others are already starting to make the turn for home."

Looking over his left shoulder Ernst shouted around his oxygen mask, "The light, did you see the light?" he asked with a plea in his voice.

"the light?' The pilot growled the next two words. 'What light? Listen to me, Luftmann Gunter. Release those bombs or I will shoot you myself for dereliction of duty and displaying cowardice in the face of the enemy. Now - get back to your station and get rid of those damn bombs."

His forehead resting on the back of his left hand, Ernst with a heavy sigh plastered his face against the eye piece of the device. Pinching a calibration knob between two gloved fingers he fed in adjustments updating their position in relation to the main target. Switching on the motor that drove the device, Ernst focused his attention on the line scales projected onto mirrors inside the bombsight's prism. Switching on his microphone, in a dispassionate voice that belay the tension he felt, Ernst started passing instructions that would guide the pilot to their target.

"Right, right... straight now... right, right..." Sweat beading up on his forehead, Ernst struggled to keep the ship on course waiting for the bomb release marker to lineup with the mark on the straight line scale. 'They had reached their destination.' Behind them through the bulkhead came a staccato of clicks followed by the hiss of metal sliding against metal as the device with cool, emotionless efficiency released the payload. Redundantly Ernst announced, "Bombs loose."

The almost immediate increase in the sounds of rushing air and roaring motors filled the now empty cavity of the ship's midsection before the bomb bay doors snapped shut. The wings of the machine no longer burdened with the extra weight lifted the craft like a cork through water as Pilot struggled to regain mastery of his steed. Ernst press down by his own inertia continued peering through the bomb sight. He had calculated earlier using their altitude and air speed that it would take around ten seconds for their bombs to finish the trip.

After a respectable pause he began counting backwards from seven. The countdown reaching the number four the ground beneath them, through the lens of the device, blossomed into a garden of orange and red as the first fusillade of bombs found their mark. The pattern of destruction took on the shape of an inverted U. A peninsula of untouched land jutted north into the middle of this conflagration, a peninsula where his bombs should have landed.

He paused a moment wondering what the good people down there would think if they knew their lives had been spared due to the intercession of a bomb aimer's hallucination.

The first of his forgotten about bombs landing just south of the tangle of track brought him back to the present. He watched his next bomb along with those of the other two planes of schwarn-four lay waste to the primary target. The destruction wrought by their bombs on the station and storehouses below had been complete.

Hissing through his teeth in frustration over the deed done by the other planes of the staffel, Ernst sat back on his heels switching off the device. Standing in a hunched over position he turned and set about braking out the collapsible chair stowed next to the Captain's. Dropping heavily into the seat he busied himself struggling to get the safety belt fastened.

The pilot in a gruff voice asked, "Well... how'd it go."

His chin planted against the chest of his flight suit, staring down at the belt buckle Ernst finely managed to finish strapping himself in. 'Sighted target, destroyed same," He mumbled with indifference.

His mood visibly brightened, the pilot patted Ernst on the knee a couple of times. "Fine, that's fine. So, what's your impression of the new bomb sight."

"Well,' Ernst began the speech he had prepared,' it's a marked improvement over the old loftern threes and BZ twos.' Taking a stab at humor he added, 'With a few more of these and men who know how to operate them we might actually have a chance of winning this war."

The pilot laughing uproariously, yawed the ship until it was pointed south toward the Channel.

Ernst now in the roll of lookout had nothing to occupy his mind. His chin planted in the palm of his right hand, staring out into the night all he saw on their long trip back to occupied France was the image of those two soulful eyes gazing back at him.

The End

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Post script, I would like to offer a heart felt apology to the people of London and all Britain who reading this might take offence in what I've written here. I'm sure many inaccuracies crept into the story but it was never my intention to cause anyone any distress.

In closing, I'd like to wish everyone everywhere comfort and joy during the holiday season and the year to come.


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